Police have launched a public mischief investigation after a car was suspended from a bridge near the Don Valley Parkway this morning as part of an apparent prank.

For hours, the car was spotted dangling from a rope underneath the Millwood Overpass Bridge, south of Don Mills Road, on Wednesday morning. It was cut down by firefighters shortly before 10 a.m., safely dropping to the ground below.

Police initially suggested that it was part of a movie shoot but later said no such shoot was authorized.

City of Toronto spokesperson Wynna Brown also confirmed that the city did not issue a permit in relation to the stunt.

Paramedics were also at the scene, on standby. One right lane of the southbound Don Valley Parkway was blocked due to emergency vehicles in the area.

In a news release issued at around 2 p.m. on Wednesday, police said that they believe the incident was intended as a prank.

“This incident resulted in the use of significant resources that were not available to attend to genuine emergency calls for service,” the release said.

Commenting on the situation on Wednesday morning, Mayor John Tory said he was “mystified” when he saw the car dangling from the bridge on television this morning.

“Fortunately the land that is right beneath that is not a neighbourhood or another street. I think it is basically green space,” he said.

“Obviously you want to see our emergency responders, as they do with all the other situations, resolve it… I think precautions have been taken so that no people are adversely affected by that.”

Tory did not have any insight into who may be responsible for the stunt.

“You’d think if it was one of those film shoots, they are very carefully organized by the film shoot companies to get permission and frankly to communicate the information so as to avoid people being worried about somebody being in a bad condition,” he said.

Police say a criminal investigation has now been launched.

“The vehicle has been taken back to one of our stations. Forensic identification services will look into it, do their investigation and we have detectives who will be looking into the background of the vehicle and possibly how it got here,” Const. Glenn Russell told CP24 at the scene.

Russell said the location where the vehicle was dangling is a “very busy area.”

“There is a walkway, there is a bicycle path that runs immediately underneath where the car was hanging,” he said.

“So the danger is very high.”